


A Waking Nightmare

by StripedScribe



Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo [3]
Category: Daredevil (TV), Deadpool - All Media Types, Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: Bad Things Happen Bingo, Gen, Injury, Team Red (Marvel) - Freeform, Trapped, Unconsciousness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-24
Updated: 2021-01-24
Packaged: 2021-03-16 15:01:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,820
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28958358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StripedScribe/pseuds/StripedScribe
Summary: Their targets tonight, part of a group they’d all been following, experimenting with weapons, on people, anything and anyone they could get their hands on. Which meant when they finally cornered them in an abandoned factory, they had to keep their wits about them, expecting beyond the normal.And then Red was gone.And then he watched Spidey go down.And then the blackness stole him as well.Bad Things Happen Bingo [Trying to Wake Them Up]
Relationships: Matt Murdock & Peter Parker & Wade Wilson
Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2117874
Comments: 2
Kudos: 18





	A Waking Nightmare

Nights when they teamed up were the best. They may not have seen eye to eye on everything, hah, he shouldn’t say that anymore, should he? What with Red? Anyway, where was he? Oh yeah, he might have had to restrain from the killing with the bleeding hearts around, but it was good fun to work alongside them. Even if Red made it seem like it was the worst thing ever to work with him, he loved it really. He was just too committed to his gruff and angry alter ego. And the kid, he didn’t like the killing, preferred the saving, a neighbourhood superhero.

But these nights, when they were fighting alongside each other for the common good, they were the best. A warped sort of team, different fight styles, different powers. Although the kid did make him, and he think Red as well, feel old and slow, as they shouted at him to slow down. They could only go so fast running, compared to his swinging. And last time he’d tried to swing either of them it hadn’t gone well, even worse for Red.

Their targets tonight, part of a group they’d all been following, experimenting with weapons, on people, anything and anyone they could get their hands on. Which meant when they finally cornered them in an abandoned factory, they had to keep their wits about them, expecting beyond the normal.

For a while though, it did seem normal though. An easy fight, even if they wouldn’t be able to identify any of them, all wearing masks, fully covered. Using fists and knives, even as Red called out that the blades stank of poison, and they all made more effort to avoid them. A disappointing fight, if they were honest with themselves, and as the doubt began to crawl up their spines. Queries over being lured out here for a pathetic fight, expecting more, expecting something worth the three of them.

Slowly their enemies did find more weapons, what looked like a tazer, just catching him, winding him for a minute. But even as the weapons ramped up, their numbers dwindled, the three of them coming out on top. It was something he’d realised, from fighting together, that enemies did tend to struggle fighting against three people with such different styles. They could switch around and bounce off of each other in ways a group who had learnt together couldn’t. It wasn’t without accidents though, even as they took each other by surprise, moving in a different way than expected. He couldn’t count how many times he’d accidentally hit, or been hit by, the others.

A door was kicked open, he flinched, saw the others flinch out the corner of his eye. Reinforcements, carrying something worse. And too far away for him to have chance to work out what they were carrying, not whilst fighting himself. Guns, bombs, knives, he wasn’t sure. He was getting out of breath, nicked by a blade, feeling the hiss of a poison weep into his skin.

And then Red hit the deck.

The new attackers stepping over the vigilante, the one in front holding what looked like a fire extinguisher, some sort of pink gas leaking out of it. Spidey was closer, but he hadn’t seen it, too busy fighting off three at once. Had barely flinched when Red fell, too caught in his own fight. He could see the moment he felt the gas, a panic, trying to run. The eyes of his suit wide with panic as he looked at Wade, dropping to his knees, a hand outstretched, and then too fell too the floor.

He was torn. To run and save himself, get out of here and come back for them. To try and win this fight, save them here and now. He chose to try and run, to just get outside, to escape the gas, but not go too far. As he turned, he panicked, noticing people in front of him now, surrounding him, wearing gas masks. Behind him, the pink gas grew closer, and he felt the moment it hit the back of his throat. He span, to try and fight, to get it destroyed, save himself from sleep. Hitting the floor, he vaguely saw Red, a cloud of pink still covering him, too far to see if he was still breathing. And Spidey, being lifted and dragged, out of the gas.

Then he was gone as well. Any last thoughts replaced by darkness and silence.

In the darkness, there were screams. His own, someone else’s, crying out for help. Rushes of pain, memories, false and real. An endless tunnel, rushing down and drown, drowning, dying over and over again, a psychedelic freak-show, limbs falling and regrowing into something else.

The real world wasn’t any nicer to him. A blow to his head as he rocked backwards, hitting a wall, trying to defend himself from things that weren’t there. After images, of limbs and blood, playing havoc with his eyes, even as they strained to see something in the blackness surrounding him. Metal underneath and around him, ridges. Echoing when he tapped it, a large room. His eyes weren’t adjusting to it, the darkness pressing in. He couldn’t see, couldn’t hear, where he was, if there was anyone else in there with him.

His panic wouldn’t help him here. He forced himself to take deeper breaths, to ride out the attacks, to squint into the darkness in some hope of seeing, to listen, to work out what was going on. Sitting upright, he held his breath, listening, for movement, for life. He heard breathing still. Slow, calm compared to his own. “Spidey? Red? Is that you?”

Silence. He reached out, trying to touch anything, before starting to crawl, not trusting the darkness, and how his head still felt woozy. His mask was still on, and he longed for the kid’s enhancements, or for Red’s senses, to be able to know this space better. Spiders could see in the dark, right? Starting with the metal behind him, he followed it round, one guide in this darkness. His outstretched hand soon hitting fabric, a suit, a leg. “Webs?” He shook the limb, then followed it up to the kids shoulder, shaking it again. “Kid? C’mon, don’t leave me alone here.” In the darkness, he couldn’t tell if he was injured, tell if he was still masked. His hand groping for the kid’s face, he breathed a sigh of relief, the mask still intact, still in place. Just out for the count still. Without leaving, he patted the area close, trying to find Red, see if they were all in here. Vaguely, he remembered Peter using a torch before, another night, another mission, from something on the suit.

“Left hand, I think, yeah.” From the shoulder, following down the arm, to his wrist, finding an assortment of buttons and sensors. “Don’t be the webs, don’t be the webs.” He was lucky, the first attempt shining a torch at the metal surrounding them. A shipping container. The kid was breathing, slow shallow breaths he could see now, and at the far end of the container, Daredevil was also laid out, his suit too rigid to see any movement. He was sure if he could be up he would though, or at least making a sound, he’d be able to hear them. Gently placing the kid’s arm back down, keeping the torch illuminating the room, he walked up to Red, crouching down close. A faint movement showed him breathing, but he too was out cold, showing no signs of waking up.

Wade had woken up with no sign of injury or damage, but he wasn’t sure, the others were so squishy, they could have been hurt, not healed like him. If he had been hurt, it was all healed, the nick in his arm from the blade as though it had never existed. He wanted to move them closer to each other, so he could keep an eye on them both. Looking back up at the light, he wondered how long it would last, if keeping it on would lose power for anything else in the suit.

He cast his mind back, trying to remember what had led to them getting here, the pink cloud, some unknown chemical. That Red had gone down first, then Spidey, then him. So why was he up first? Had they done something else, or was it just his enhancements healing him up past it? Who would wake up next?

Decided against attempting to move them, he found a position as close to the middle, and tried to listen, to hear if there was anyone outside. Silence was all that met him, the walls thick enough to hide any noise, or simply there was no one around. He was dragged by his pondering as the light suddenly started to flash, murmurs from Spiderman, and then a shout.

“No! Ben! No!” Oh kid. The nightmares were a gas thing, not a Wade thing then. Loud footsteps on metal led him up to the spider, and he crouched down again by his side, talking to him, trying to help him out of it. Peter’s arms thrashed, he winced as they knocked against the metal, sure to leave a bruise.

“Come on kid, you’re fine, it’s just a bad dream. Not that it’s much better out here awake, but it’s a nightmare, I know, I know.” Peter bolted upright, a hand going towards Wade’s throat, who moved back, arms held up, even as the torch flicked off. “It’s me kid, Spidey, you’re all good, it was just a dream.” Plunged into darkness again, he tried to blink some sight back into his eyes, reaching to to Peter, trying to find his arm, to offer some reassurance.

“The fuck happened.”

“They got us, that gas. Not sure what it was, but it took us all out easily. And the nightmare thing wasn’t just you, I had an awful one before I came round. Had to hack your suit to get a light up, we’re in some sort of shipping container. Exits looking minimal but one of these walls must be a door.”

“What about Red?”

“He’s down the other end. No signs of life yet, but he’s breathing. He went down first.” Peter flicked the torch back on, shining it onto Red’s body.

“Yeah, I heard him go, thought they’d just winded him. Why isn’t he up yet?”

“I don’t know.” An outstretched hand, and Wade pulled Peter back to his feet, noticing him shake his head a little at the wooziness.

“Different powers maybe? You’ve got healing, I’ve got a little healing, he’s human in that aspect.”

Nodding, Wade moved back towards Matt, Peter following behind, his steps a little unsteady still. “They moved you out of the gas pretty quickly as well. He was still down when I went down, they’d already taken you out of the way.”

“More of it, and human. Fuck. How long you been back for?”

“5, 10 minutes maybe?”

“You reckon he’ll be that long?”

Wade grimaced, trying to think of their respective powers, compare them. “I don’t know.”

“Some sort of pink gas, wasn’t it?”

“Yeah, they had it in what looked like a fire extinguisher.”

Peter shook his head, sucking the air through his teeth. “I don’t know what that could be. And in here anyway, I couldn’t get anything to counter it. I’m guessing phones are out of action?”

“I haven’t even looked yet.” They both pulled out phones, the flash of ‘no signal’ ruining that bit of hope. “Yeah that’s to be expected.”

Returning to Matt, they tried to wake him up. Shaking, shouting at him. But he slumbered on, looking lifeless, pale in the minimal light.

“Wait, Webs, you didn’t have any injuries when you woke up did you? New at least?”

“Nothing major, think they’d scraped the back of my leg dragging me in here, but not really. I’m assuming you didn’t?”

“Just checking how carefully they’d have looked after us, after him. I wanted to move one of you earlier when you were both out of it so you were together, but without knowing injuries.”

“You want to move him like this?” Still no sign of movement, even as Peter lifted up his hand, letting it drop back down.

“I’m just thinking out loud, if we don’t know how long he’ll be out of it, we might be better to start trying to break out first.”

“Yeah. Yeah that’s true.” His voice sounded defeated, and worried, even as he pulled on the Devil again, getting him into some semblance of a recovery position. “He should be a little safer there.”

“We’ll keep an eye on him.” They both knew the unsaid words, ‘Just in case. Just in case he stops breathing, gets worse.’ It was worrying them, even though the wouldn’t say it out loud, that he wasn’t waking up yet. That for all their trying there was nothing they could do for him, and that they’d have to give up, leave him there unconscious whilst they found a way out of this cage.

They soon worked out which of the short ends was a door, it was flush, no sign of any easy way to get out. And at the end furthest away from Matt, which meant no having to move him out the way, but meant he was out of sight without any light on him. Wade pushed on it, trying to push it out, but it didn’t even move. As Peter pushed on it, it budged a little, half buckling, half opening. He took a run back, before jumping into it, metal crashing creaking as it fell down. And with it, him, saved by Wade’s outstretched arm, and pulling himself back into the crate.

The sound still hadn’t woken Matt. Looking out, they were a fair distance off the ground, and it was now daylight. 2 containers underneath their own, and not a soul around who would have seen their escape.

“And he’s still not up with that.” Worry was digging further in, an anxious knot, even as Wade knelt back down, reassuring himself that the Devil was still breathing, was still alive, just out for the count.

“His is closest, right?”

“Yeah. Shit it’s a weekday, his partner.” Wade patted down Matt’s suit, finding the burner phone. The screen smashed past any recognition, he fought with the voice recognition for a few seconds. “Any idea his system as I can’t exactly look on here?”

“Initials I think. Must be F?” With far too little effort for Wade’s liking, Peter had got the Devil up, standing, and then in some sort of fireman’s carry, one arm secured around his legs. They weren’t too different in height, but the kid had always been scrawny, and it looked an impossible task. God-damned superpowers.

An awkward call later, and they were headed back to Hell’s Kitchen. A promise to Foggy that they weren’t just going to abandon him, they would sit for as long as was needed, and try to work out what it was so they could neutralise it. He was still going to leave work though. It was almost like he didn’t trust them.

“We did drag him out to help us. And are now bringing him back unconscious.” Peter added, oh so unhelpfully.

“Just pile on the guilt Webs. It was a combined effort, he was chasing this gang as well.”

“I think they’ve got better those two?” He questioned, continuing their journey along the rooftops. Wade longed for a taxi, for a break, to stop running across goddamn roofs like some sort of idiots.

“Yeah, I think because they made an agreement he wouldn’t go up against things he couldn’t handle. And yet here we are having been kidnapped.”

Peter could only sigh in agreement as he made a leap across a gap, webs assisting. Wade, just behind him, winced as he saw Matt’s head bounce against Peter’s back. “If he didn’t have a concussion he’ll have one by the end of this.”

Peter stopped, and Matt’s head bounced again, devil horns pointing to the floor. “Fuck, is it that bad?”

“He’s a lil bouncy. A lil unconscious. I’m sure he’ll be fine.” Wade reached over, patting the back of Matt’s head.

“Fuck. We’re almost there, and getting a taxi or on the train in the day with an unconscious vigilante wouldn’t go marvellously.”

“He injures himself enough daily, I’m sure a light concussion from being rescued won’t add too much more.”

“All I can think is that I want to get him home before he wakes up. I lashed out bad enough at you when I woke up.”

“I don’t blame you for that. I was just as confused, I don’t know how he’ll be.”

They continued on in silence, getting steadily closer to Matt’s apartment, and getting steadily more worried as he showed no signs of waking up. “He’s been asleep a lot longer than I think is healthy. Call Claire maybe? Get her to head around if she can. She’s used to fixing him, although I’m not sure what of this can be fixed.”

“Hmm.” Yet another awkward phone call, nope, no one was immediately dying, yes it was daylight, no they’re fine. “She’ll head round in a bit, before her shift starts. She doesn’t know what to do either, not without knowing what it was. Rest and hope for the best, she might try and take some bloods, see if she can identify it at work.”

“We need better medical care.” He wriggled the Devil over his shoulder, trying to loosen the now stiffening joint.

“You’re the one who turned down the Avengers, you could have their team at your beck and call.”

“But I wouldn’t get to hang round with you all the time.”

“Aw Spidey, you’re so kind.”

“Where else would I end up lugging a sleeping Daredevil across Hell’s Kitchen in the middle of the day?”

“Exactly, all the benefits you get. And working with this beautiful face.”

They carried on in silence for a while, before Wade broke it, his thoughts coming to the surface. “What do you think they were planning to do?” As soon as the words were out his mouth, he regretted them. He didn’t want to think, to make up any sort of possibilities. Whether they were just planning to let them die in there, forgetting about super strength. Or if they were there for torture, for experiments.

“I don’t know. I don’t think I want to know or think about that.”

“Fuck, we came no closer to getting them out the city. And they know how to get us.”

“It’s gone past our level. I’ll try and get in contact with the Avengers. They just left us in there though! I don’t understand.”

“Not expecting us to wake up so soon, or they got otherwise distracted?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know Wade, and right now, until Matt’s back, I can’t even think it’s all over. We were out for what, a good 6 hours I’d guess? Who knows what they could have done. We’d have healed if it was anything slight, anything small.”

“Fuck. You think they did something to us?”

Peter’s silence was enough to answer, as they walked through into Matt’s apartment, slowly easing him down to the couch. “He’s not shown any signs of life, has he?”

“Nothing. And with the dreams we both had when we woke, I think we’d see it if he was starting to come round.” He shuddered, it took a lot to freak him out, they all knew that. But something in the dream, that he’d never tell anyone, not even the readers, was too wrong.

“What are we supposed to do?”

“Sit, wait, wait for Claire to turn up, wait for him to wake up? We just came out of it by ourselves, I’d assume he would too? Eventually?” Unspoken words continued to hang between them, what if he didn’t wake up, what if he got worse. Wade tried shaking him again, lifeless limbs just floppy, his head rolling onto his chest. “I can’t stand to see him like this.”

“I’m going to get out of this suit.” Peter turned, moving away, going to raid Matt’s clothes for something to wear. Wade just watched him go, pulling his own mask off, and slumping on the couch next to Matt. 

They were meant to be a team, they weren’t supposed to be carrying unconscious people home with them, they were meant to win the fights. Even as he took Matt’s mask off, revealing his face, there was no reaction. As he tried to wake him up, talking to him, shouting, pleading.

Something deep down gave him the sense that this wouldn’t be the last time they’d have to carry each other home. That as they thought they were getting on top of the city, on top of the crime, they’d bring in something new, something more dangerous, and they’d have to scrabble to stay on top of it.

He couldn’t die, he could be torn apart a thousand times, and still get back together, as long as there was someone there to pick up the pieces. But Peter, Matt, they were squishy, they were human. Peter less so, a little bit of healing, a lot more strength. Might need a bit of a hand to heal up a particularly nasty wound, but could get himself out of danger as well. Matt. Matt had nothing. He could fight, he could sense things none of them ever could and was always steps ahead the rest of them. But when he got hit he went down, and there was only so much damage he could go through.

Only so many times Wade could watch, could read, of him getting put through the wringer. And if it was getting worse? He could be forgiven for wanting to stop Matt from fighting, to try and convince him to give it up, give it in. Hell, even the kid. It was above their paygrade, what they’d fought today, more apt to the Avengers, someone with that force behind them. Not that he would ever admit he wanted to give it up.

But to save those two? He’d hang up the mask in an instant, give in his weapons, drag them away to the country to start a new life.

They would never agree to that though.

He braced himself, for whatever the future would hold. Whatever pain they’d be put through, the whump, the angst. For there were people out there, he knew, that wanted nothing more than to put them all through pain, or who watched on, powerless, as bad things happened. To them, it was just a story. Something happening elsewhere, to someone else.


End file.
